Strategic Solutions for Park Partnerships
Belle Isle Conservancy – One Step at a Time Belle Isle, the 985 acre-island and city park in the Detroit River – and the crown jewel of Detroit’s park system on the one hand, is in trouble. It has a backlog of clean-up, restoration, and environmental challenges that would make any park conservancy director’s head …
Land Trusts and Park Conservancies: In the Same Business…or Not? Peter Harnik, Director of The Trust for Public Land’s Center for City Park Excellence (CCPE) – a sponsor of this blog site – recently spoke to attendees of the New Jersey Land Conservation Rally in a keynote address about some of the differences he observes …
Since January I’ve talked with leaders at city parks and their partners from Rose Kennedy Greenway in Boston all the way to Caras Park in Missoula, Montana, studying park conservancies, BIDs and downtown associations in partnership with city and state agencies to manage, maintain, program and fund public parks – mostly downtown parks. I’ve been …
Rose Kennedy Greenway: Building a Three-Legged Stool The Rose Kennedy Greenway in downtown Boston sits on land created from the Big Dig, a megaproject in Boston that rerouted the Central Artery (Interstate 93), the chief highway through the heart of the city, into a 3.5-mile tunnel. According to Wikipedia, the Big Dig was the most …
Right-Sizing Park Stewardship The Central Park Conservancy manages 843 acres. Prospect Park Alliance partners with the city to oversee 585 acres. And the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy stewards over 1700 acres with its parks department. On the other hand, Sister Cities Park in Philadelphia is less than five acres. And Republic Square in Austin is less …
Today’s blog entry picks up on my entry from last week focusing on conversations with Tupper Thomas, former President of the Prospect Park Alliance and Administrator of Prospect Park in Brooklyn, and Meg Cheever, current President and CEO of Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy. Pioneers in public-private partnerships for parks, both Meg and Tupper’s years of experience …
City Park Partnerships: The Governance Role Last week’s blog focused on the role of BIDs in park management and programming. BIDs generally have been studied quite a bit by academics and urban economists, and case studies abound even if their role in managing parks is relatively new. In contrast, park conservancies or “friends of the …
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Most stakeholders in private public partnerships for parks agree that a good relationship – based on trust, competence and a shared vision – is the foundation for good collaboration toward realizing shared goals. The key part of collaboration is that it requires a close look at the behavior and strengths of both partners – generally …
BIDs Serving Parks: A Philadelphia Story In May of 2012, the Center City District in Philadelphia cut the ribbon on a renovated Sister Cities Park, located along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. The $5 million renovation project is leased by Center City District (CCD) for $1 a year from the City of Philadelphia’s Parks & Recreation …
A recent New York Times story on BP, the London-based oil and gas company, used the problems facing BP and its origins as a public company to argue that in some cases public control can outperform private – citing in particular the challenge of balancing the goals of public interest and private profit. There is …
A blog dedicated to talking about public-private partnerships created for parks has to begin with one of the oldest and most successful – the City of New York and the Central Park Conservancy. When the Central Park Conservancy was formed in 1980 the idea of a public-private partnership for parks that went beyond just fundraising …
At the end of 2012, in November, the Brookings Institution released the first of a series of policy proposals for reviving metropolitan economies. One of them calls for the federal government to establish a national unit supporting public-private partnerships: In a time of constrained public budgets, leveraging private-sector financial resources and expertise to deliver a …
Continue reading “Public-Private Partnerships for Parks: Tapping the Wisdom of Their Success”